


unfinished business

by Lulannie



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-27
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-10-17 22:59:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17569550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lulannie/pseuds/Lulannie
Summary: Kara wants to say no. She wants to trust this calm woman and her pale eyes and her seaside voice. But Kara also wants to survive another week of her travels without getting her throat slit in the night by some charming stranger.





	unfinished business

The deer is only ten feet ahead of her now - the closest it’s ever been. She can hear it breathe softly. Though alert, it’s not panicked. She strains for its heartbeat. Regular, typical. No signs of suspicion. No signs it can sense her.

She shifts the knife, edging forward to where the clearing opens, flicking her eyes from the deer to the trees to the deer to her feet to the ground to the deer careful careful careful no sudden movements.

Her foot taps hollowly against a thick root and she freezes. The deer stills.

It blinks slowly - it’s as tired as she is - then leans its head back down the grass.

She wants to let out a breath of a sigh, but it’s not time to celebrate yet. She braces her foot against the root, ready to push off.

One.

Two—

A flock of birds burst from the trees and the deer bolts.

“Shit!”

Kara throws subtlety to the wind and sprints after it. The floor of the clearing is soft and makes her stumble, but the gnarled ground and whipping branches of the forest are no better. She watches the deer prance between a pair of V-shaped trees, losing sight of it as the foliage becomes too dense.

Minutes later and she still can’t see it. Her lungs feel bruised and her throat is cut raw by the sharp wintry air. Her legs start to wheel awkwardly, carried now by sheer momentum. She falls against a tree, a crushing combination of hunger and humiliation dragging her to the ground. Is this her? Is this Kara Zor-El, formidable soldier of Grant’s Kingdom? Is this her, unable to catch a single god damn deer?

It sucks if it is.

She hears a scream, and after confirming that it isn’t her own emotional pain manifesting itself, recognises it as the sound she would have once heard at the end of a successful hunt: the victory call, the deer’s last words.

It’s still near.

With renewed vigour, Kara pushes herself from the foot of the tree and hacks her way through the forest.

There’s another, smaller clearing, and in the centre is a woman, as young or younger than Kara herself, standing over the unmoving animal. The deer sprawled across the forest floor as if it had been flung from the woman and killed on impact. Kara is wary. She grasps subtly for her knife, but curses upon realising she’s left it where she’d been slumped beneath the trees.

The other woman has already seen her and gestures vaguely to the deer.

“Want to go halves?”

The offer is so casual and unexpected that Kara is thrown off balance.

“Halves?” she sputters, her suspicion replaced by incredulity, “Halves? I’ve been tracking that thing for the best part of a day, and I’m just about to finally get it when you just swoop in and— and— __Halves__?”

The woman looks affronted, offended.

“Fine. You take the best cuts and I’ll have the rest.”

Again, Kara is thrown off guard by the nonchalance of it all. It’s not that most people she meets on the road are unkind or selfish, they just, very reasonably, value their own needs over those of strangers. This is... unusual.

Kara nods, trying to appear gruff despite how many times her voice has just broken in that miniature monologue. She walks over, retaining a sensible distance from the stranger. 

“I’ll get started. Light’s almost out.”

She crouches to asses the animal, using the last of the evening sun to mark a spot to begin skinning. She reaches for her knife but— oh yeah.

Wary of revealing that she is defenseless, Kara considers the risks associated with asking the other woman for a blade. What’s to stop this stranger, who is standing while Kara crouches, from murdering her where she is and taking the meat?

Said woman is currently rummaging in a cloth bag, too conspicuously to unsettle Kara any further, and Kara has a moment to properly look at her. She’s surprisingly clean and pale, almost regal-looking, with a face of sharp lines, straight, dark hair and pale eyes. She makes Kara feel suddenly self conscious of her travel-worn appearance, of her muddied cloak and face and wild hair. The woman’s voice doesn’t match her appearance; it’s soft and lilted with the common accent of the West, undulating gently up and down as— Oh hell, she’s actually saying something, offering some glinting object to Kara.

The woman has a jade handle pointed towards Kara, the blade, catching in the dusk light, towards herself - a show of trust that Kara appreciates but finds nonetheless incredulous. Just how green is this poor girl?

Kara thanks her and takes the knife. As she starts to section the animal, the other woman collects branches and begins to prop them in a neat triangle. Kara notes - not that she’s watching - that the woman neglects to gather any kindling, starting with large and mid-sized pieces of wood. Kara’s now almost certain that she’s gotten herself mixed up with a complete novice, and as much as it pains her conscience to admit, she can’t afford to carry any extra weight on this journey, not where she’s going. The woman looks clean enough, and not underfed, so surely she should fare just fine alone? It would be unwise to travel through the night, so maybe Kara will slip out at first light, leaving this stranger a good portion of the deer, maybe one of her smaller cloaks...

Her stomach grumbles. She pulls away two decent pieces of meat, cleans them quickly and brings them over to the “fire”. No longer so wary, Kara hands the woman back her knife.

She goes to say something about the kindling, trying to breach the topic so as not to embarrass the woman, but she’s interrupted.

“Just lay it on there,” the woman says, gesturing to a crude lattice of branches near the point of the triangle.

Kara is hungry and so, so tired, but she can’t bring herself to argue, so she does as she’s told and flops to the ground beside the construction.

The woman sits gracefully and peers into the heart of the wood structure.

“Fire.”

A column of hot white and orange bursts up from the ground, expanding out and licking at Kara’s boots, making her scramble back on her hands and feet before the heat shrinks down to settle in the dry branches, crackling like an hour-old fire. The woman reaches out her white palms to warm them against the flames, but Kara is still huffing in surprise.

“You’re a— Woah. I’ve only ever met one before, and he was all old and beardy and pointy-hatted and could only really conjure toads... But you! You’re—! No wonder you don’t need a knife…”

The woman nods, “I have enough ways to protect myself.”

Kara bobs her head up and down enthusiastically. She doesn’t know whether to now be more or less frightened of this woman. Surely if she’d been planning to rob Kara, she would have done it by now, rather than reveal herself like this. Or maybe this is a sign of strength? A ‘don’t mess with me or I’ll cremate you’ sort of threat? Either way, Kara can’t withhold her curiosity.

“Where’d you learn to do that? What else can you do?”

The woman looks amused and stirs the fire.

“I can’t be telling you everything. A lady needs her secrets.”

Kara sighs but doesn’t prod, instead asking, “Could I at least know your name? Since we’re campfire buddies and all.”

“It’s Lena. Could you turn those over?”

Kara does so, having half forgotten they had a meal on the way.

“I’m Kara. Zor-El.”

“Zor-El?” Lena asks, raising a brow, “As in Captain Zor-El?”

Kara shifts.

“Mm, that’s me. Well, it was, and maybe it will be again.”

They pause conversation for some time as the meat is perfected on the potent fire. They lay their respective portions on whatever plate-like object each can find in their bags. Lena pulls a wrapped package of hard bread from a pouch, giving some to Kara and receiving a skin of water in return. They eat in silence, Kara splitting her bread and slapping the meat in the middle while Lena cuts and skewers the meat delicately with her knife. It’s not the most graceful affair, but it keeps them warm as the last evidence of the day disappears from the sky.

Lena looks contemplative, resuming where they left off. “What’s Kara Zor-El doing so far from Grant’s Kingdom?”

Kara lays another branch on the fire.

“Trying to get back, actually,” she muses, “my mother lives in Midvale and she fell ill last winter - she’s fine now - but my sister was on a mission and couldn’t come away, so I went up. I ended up staying longer than planned—“ She laughs. “—which is why I’m making this trip in winter again.”

“Is your position still waiting for you? I’m afraid haven’t been able to keep up with the news from Grant’s Kingdom.”

Kara shakes her head wryly.

“If it is, it’s going to have to wait a little longer. My sister and I have some... unfinished business in Thorul. I’m just passing through National City to pick her up and cash in some favours.”

“All sounds very clandestine.”

“Not for long.”

Lena plays along.

“Oh?”

“Mm,” Kara hums, then leans in conspiratorially, “I’ve got a thing or two to reveal about the Luthor family.”

Lena stills, but her eyes light up.

“You have?”

“Well, I will,” Kara admits, “we’re a little lacking in the evidence department currently, but I swear we’re onto something.”

Lena’s face is unreadable.

“No disrespect, but do you really believe you can take on the Luthors? They aren’t the Grants; they play by no rules but their own.”

Kara stares into the fire.

“I know that. But I have to,” she says, and continues when Lena doesn’t reply, “They took my father.”

Lena is silent.

The fire crackles.

They don’t return to the subject. They discuss the weather, the price of fish, the reported grain shortages in the south. Lena is reserved, but encourages Kara to tell stories of her travels and her family and what it’s really like to work for the Grants. After some time, despite the roaring fire, the night chill begins to set in.

Kara smiles at Lena, then stands and walks to the edge of the clearing to haul the deer over one shoulder. If Lena notices how easily Kara handles the hundred-pound animal, she doesn’t mention it.

“I’m gonna go truss him up.”

Kara trudges through the darkness until she reaches a tall tree, the same one she’d not long ago been slumped against. She retrieves her knife from the base, using it to cut some spare rope to secure around the thing’s feet. She leaves her belongings on the ground for a moment as she springs up the tree, animal in hand, tying it up once high enough for the smell not to attract any unwanted attention.

She returns to the clearing soon after, finding Lena half-asleep by the fire. Kara notes the green grip of the knife in the pack under Lena’s head. Kara’s wariness returns.

“Something wrong?” Lena asks, clearly more lucid than Kara had guessed.

Kara wants to say no. She wants to trust this calm woman and her pale eyes and her seaside voice. But Kara also wants to survive another week of her travels without getting her throat slit in the night by some charming stranger. It occurs to her that for all their amicable conversation, she doesn’t know a thing about Lena, bar her first name and her ability to set things alight, which isn’t particularly comforting.

Lena is still looking at her. Kara stands up straighter.

“How am I to know you won’t wake up in the night and rob me?”

Lena looks amused - not really what Kara was going for.

“How am I to know you won’t do the same? Cut my throat and make off with the whole animal that you yourself trussed up in some undisclosed location?”

Kara doesn’t have an answer for that. She’s been awake since yesterday’s sunset, and a year out of duty has stripped her somewhat of her tactical reasoning.

Lena seems to speak Kara’s own mind.

“Just sleep.”

Kara acquiesces, pulling out a second cloak to drape over herself, all the while considering that perhaps Lena is better off than she is, that Lena probably wouldn’t find much benefit in murdering some poorly-equipped, semi-retired soldier in the woods. Hell, if Kara were the type, she’d be the smart one to snatch any provisions of Lena’s and disappear into the night.

But she doesn’t. She lies on her back, watching the stars wink to life inside a halo of trees. She can hear no large animals or creatures and so resolves to sleep.

“Kara?”

She rolls her head to the side to see Lena’s body facing hers from the other side of the fire.

“Yes?”

“You want to take on the Luthors?”

“Mm.”

“You’ll need someone on the inside.”

Kara is fully awake now.

“You know someone?”

Lena hums. The green knife glints in the moonlight.

“I’ll tell you about it in the morning.”


End file.
